The editorial categories are research topics that have guided researchers during the recovery phase and continue to be the impetus behind the Documents Project’s digital archive and the Critical Documents book series. Developed by the project’s Editorial Board, each of the teams analyzed this framework and adapted it to their local contexts in developing their research objectives and work plans during the Recovery Phase. Learn more on the Editorial Framework page.

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Synopsis

In this project, the Estridentista-trend artist, Luis Quintanilla, aimed for the renovation of a variety of languages by combining theater, music and the visual arts in the Russian avant-garde mood, always along the lines of the great popular traditions. The set and the wardrobe were designed by the painter Carlos González, who created the colorful vistas that became the stage set in accordance with the principle of the rapid or synthetic theater introduced by the Futurists.

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The “Theater of the Bat” was inspired by Luis Quintanilla’s reaction to Le chauve-souris [The Bat], the variety show created by the Russian Nikita Balieff that was staged in Paris and other European cities, and subsequently in New York, where Quintanilla saw it. Balieff’s “Theater of the Bat” echoes the work of the Russian avant-garde that drew inspiration from the colorful customs of peasant tradition. The Mexico-based Argentine writer Luis Mario Schneider (1931–1999) considered it to be, perhaps, the best and most beautiful catalogue of the history of Mexican stage.